Congratulations Cat! I can tell you feel the same way I did when I first scaled a lily. I found myself making it the main topic at our garden club meeting... passing the scales with attached bulblets around the table. Nobody had seen or heard of such a thing to propagate lilies!

I had never heard of it until I joined ATP! I was a little leery to try it with the more expensive bulbs, lol. So I used some of the cheaper ones just for the experiment. At least now I can try doing some of the others with out feeling like I have to look at them every day. Who Knew!

Joe, I am just keeping them covered with a dish towel. That should work, right?

Cat
"Plant your own garden and decorate your own soul, instead of waiting for someone to bring you flowers." - Veronica A. Shoffstall

If it is a dark dish towel that doesn't let light through. If the bulb sees enough light it will likely sprout a leaf and you are trying to get the bulblet as big as you can before using energy to sprout leaves. This year I had a bulblet start to put out a tiny leaf while the bulblet was small. I pinched off the leaf and I made sure it was in a dark place at which point the bulb started bulking up and using more of the scales reserves to build the new bulblet.

Joebass said:If it is a dark dish towel that doesn't let light through. If the bulb sees enough light it will likely sprout a leaf and you are trying to get the bulblet as big as you can before using energy to sprout leaves. This year I had a bulblet start to put out a tiny leaf while the bulblet was small. I pinched off the leaf and I made sure it was in a dark place at which point the bulb started bulking up and using more of the scales reserves to build the new bulblet.

Joe, when I weigh one thing against another, it being August 5th and all, I would be inclined to pot them up now and obtain as many leaves as possible before they have to be put into winter resting/chill cycle. For every new little leaf that shows, that's another little scale. We're working against the clock here. I would pot the scales with bulblets attached just as they are in the picture. Plant about 1/2 to 3/4 inch deep. The little scaled bulblets will be dual nurtured by both mother scale and the potting mix. The root system will develop faster as well and soil nurturing will soon out pace scale nurturing and the bulblet will discharge the old scale, used up or not. If we figure the growth cycle deadline as Nov 15th, we've got a good 80 to 90 natural growing days until chill. What I am afraid would happen if we continued to grow the bulblets on the scales, they would eventually start growing leaves in the bags at some point anyway. And if they start that, it's hard to stop. They wouldn't be conditioned for the chill and growth is likely to continue, even in the dark chill. That's a real mess and a failure because those bulblets will not survive once chilled and potted or potted and chilled, either way.

A good time to let a bulblet grow on the mother scale as long as possible is with Fall scaling that's done in late October-November time frame. In that case, time is on our side, and we can get nice, big bulblets without green growth with plenty of time left to chill.

But your right, Joe. The primary objective should always be to get the biggest bulblet one can. Stick to it!. Except in rare circumstances that is the gospel. One exception would be when somebody offers you the opportunity to 'rob' a few scales from a rare plant in mid summer you just can't live without, or another is when someone in the southern hemisphere sends you some valuable scales from their spring bulbs ready to grow but it's August here and vice-versa if we send some down into the southern hemisphere.

Then you have surprises like Cat, who just learned the thrill of scaling (in the off season) and an over zealous scaler like myself who thinks he knows how to navigate through both the procedure and the calendar to make things work out in the end. Such is the case here. In reality, Joe and Cat, both procedures would work, except if we let the bulblets grow on the scales longer, we may have to extend the growing season a bit under lights. But, to give you both an idea of where we would be at on or about Sept 10th to the 15th if potted now, check the last two pictures. Two sets of scales, 4 each, were put into incubation June 5th.

Potted on July 1st

Here they are on July 15th

Here they are on August 4th

As you can see, even tiny bulblets really take off when dual nurturing is involved. It'll surprise ya! These were given their first feeding of dilute 4-10-3 on July 15th to speed root development.

Catherine--I suggest you divide your scale/bulblets into two groups and try both ways. On the group you pot now, water in when finished, then keep inside uncovered until they begin to shoot up (because the temperature is more constant). When the surface becomes very dry in about 10 days or so, mist to moisten the soil surface. Avoid city tap water